I am the editor of Forbes Magazine, and believe strongly that entrepreneurial capitalism and market-based thinking can solve the world's problems. This is my second stint at Forbes -- between 1991 and 1997, I was a reporter, a staff writer (five cover stories), associate editor and Washington bureau chief. In between, I caught the start-up bug: I co-founded P.O.V. Magazine (Adweek's Startup of the Year), and then launched Doubledown Media (Trader Monthly, Dealmaker, Private Air, etc.). As a fattening hobby, I have reviewed restaurants for various magazines since college (and was a National Magazine Award finalist for my wine writing). I used to think chronicling the world's greatest business minds made me a great entrepreneur, but I now realize my time as an entrepreneur made me an acute business journalist. For the full story, check out my book, just out in paperback, The Zeroes: My Misadventures In the Decade Wall Street Went Insane.

This Independence Day, These Surprising Voices Honor Our Freedom

There’s poignancy to seeing Egypt wake up on July 4th with a new government, new fears and new hope, driven by the apparent will of the people.

As an American, it’s also complicated. Egypt’s first democratically-elected president has been deposed and arrested by the military. Yet that president, who previously claimed that Jews descended from apes and pigs, had leveraged the legitimacy of his election to declare himself above any decision of Egypt’s courts or legislators.

So who should an American small-d democrat root for on this Independence Day? Let me introduce you to seven of them.

Exactly two years ago, I was in Cairo, interviewing young Arabs about their thoughts on America. It was an exciting place: the citizens of the Arab world’s largest, most influential country had just overthrown their dictator. While unsure of what was coming next, the people I spoke with were giddy with their accomplishment, and full of dreamy idealism. Walking through Tahrir Square, the uprising’s hub, I noted that the tourist hawkers had returned, now selling T-shirts bearing the logo of the revolution’s essential tool: Facebook.

The highlight of my trip, which also encompassed polling young Arabs in Lebanon, Morocco and the UAE, was hosting an informal lunch with seven of Egypt’s leading young bloggers, most of whom had been heroes of the Tahrir Square revolution. Treating them to a meal of grilled meat and lemon shakes at Tabouleh, a dark Lebanese restaurant in Cairo’s Garden City district, I asked where they envisioned their country going.

A couple overarching observations. First, young Egyptians are a suspicious, conspiratorial lot. They grew up being force-fed lies by the poisonous state media, and that now manifests itself in a group that believes nothing they can’t see themselves (the unfortunate corollary is that a random YouTube video often holds as much credence as a New York Times report, although they trust foreign news services far more than domestic ones). The Wikileaks revelations of the time fed that sentiment mightily.

Second, Egyptian millennials aren’t dissimilar from the depiction of their American counterparts. Self-esteem runs rampant, and that fuels change. One of the bloggers, Safa, explained how her generation’s education centered on being told they were the best, the proud children of the cradle of culture. Seeds of the original revolution thus came partly from entitlement: the harsh realities of Egyptian life clashed with what they had been taught to expect.

Third, America lost credibility by vacillating during the overthrow of Mubarak. I was in the presence of brave people who, if Egyptian democracy sticks, might go down as the Thomas Paines of their country. They were at a loss for why we, the beneficiaries of the American Revolution, hadn’t quickly embraced them in their fight against the Egyptian version of George III. “We proved,” said Neg, “that the Americans didn’t know anything.”

Perhaps “the Americans” didn’t. But, in their eyes, America does. My biggest takeaway was their desperate thirst for what we celebrate today: a country of the people, by the people, for the people, where freedom and the rule of law that supports it sit above everything else.

On a similar tour of the region in 2004, I had been inundated with questions about how to get an American visa. These post-revolution Egyptians wanted to emulate what they admired about America, rather than move to it. “We own our own country now,” said Amhad, the most pro-U.S. blogger in the group. “We don’t have to go to other countries.” Safa, a skeptic of America, insisted that she didn’t want our money, but rather guidance for Egyptians “to make sure we go the right way.” Tellingly, given the events of this week, the group unanimously agreed that America was welcome, and even encouraged, to criticize their lurching road to democracy.

The most moving part of the lunch came shortly after I asked a fiery blogger named Karim for three words that, to him, embodied the U.S. He said he could almost come up with two, “domination” and “interference” (“no three”). But shortly after that this critic of American power, a Tahrir Square hero, made a telling request: a translated copy of the U.S. Constitution. Amid the cookouts and fireworks, I intend to appreciate that today, and the country I’m lucky to call home.

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